Saturday, March 10, 2012

Agents of S.W.I.N.G

Agents of S.W.I.N.G. has been a good guide to the ways of the FATE RPG. Having been a gamer for more of my life than not being one I've studied many different RPG systems. Some of them are very calculated, extremely logical and some even very realistic (GURPS, I'm looking in your direction). So trying to wrap one's head around the FATE system can be difficult at first. There is a degree of unlearning that has to be done. The best way to do this is to actually play the game. When one isn't able to do that you read the rulebook and seek out the online communities. Fortunately, the FATE fanbase has some particularly helpful contributors out there.

When it comes to the rulebook (FATE books tend to be large for some reason and this one is no exception), Agents of S.W.I.N.G. is very good in that it has a plethora of examples. One whole chapter is dedicated to NPCs that illustrate various ways characters could be made and Aspects that could be assigned. These NPCs are also a lot of fun, they're all characters from the movies, shows, books, and comics that inspired Agents of S.W.I.N.G. Some of the characters are pretty obvious- just barely changed, the serial numbers thinly filed off, many where not so obvious to me.

On the RPG Geeks database, some very astute geeks have made the effort to compiled a list of which NPCs are based on who: